The present invention relates generally to tools for installing plastic blind fasteners, and more particularly to an adapter suitable for use with a hand tool for installing plastic blind fasteners in areas of limited access.
Plastic blind fasteners or rivets abound in many industrial and commercial products. They are especially useful for securing a panel to a frame member or for mounting a component to a panel where only one side of the panel is accessible during assembly. A typical fastener, preferably of permanently deformable plastic, includes a slotted sleeve with a collar at one end and a shaft extending from the other end through the collar to a head. When securing a component to a panel, the sleeve is slidably inserted through aligned holes in the component and panel with the slots extending beyond the relatively inaccessible or "blind" side of the panel. An outward pull on the head, opposed by an equal force on the collar, causes the sleeve portions between the slots to deform radially against the blind side of the panel and tighten the component against the collar. Barbs around the shaft engage the collar to prevent retraction.
Special tools are well-known for installing such blind fasteners. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,653,309 discloses a tool, hand-operated like pliers, in which opposed claws are placed between the head on the extended end of the shaft and the collar of the fastener. When the handles are squeezed together the claws spread the head and collar apart. For some hard-to-reach fastening locations the claws are located on the distal end of a long rigid tube and are manipulated by handles removably attached to the other end. Such tools are satisfactory for installing fasteners in products having only a few hard-to-reach locations, but they lack the versatility and practicability needed in products with fasteners required at many different locations of limited access. This is because the length and bend of the tube is fixed. A multiplicity of variously configured interchangeable tubes would be needed to reach different hard-to-reach areas. This increases tool inventory, as well as fastener installation time necessary for interchanging the tools, and may significantly affect manufacturing costs of a product.